Mario Puzo

Who was Mario Puzo?

Mario Francis Puzo (; Italian: [ˈmaːrjo ˈputtso, -ddzo]; October 15, 1920 – July 2, 1999) was an American author and screenwriter. His final novel, The Family, was released posthumously in 2001. Mario Francis Puzo was born in the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City on, to Italian immigrants from the Province of Avellino; his father was from Pietradefusi and his mother from Ariano Irpino. When Puzo was 12, his father, who worked as a trackman for the New York Central Railroad, was committed to the Pilgrim State Hospital for schizophrenia, and his wife Maria was left to raise their seven children. Puzo graduated from the City College of New York. He wrote crime novels about the Italian-American Mafia and Sicilian Mafia, most notably The Godfather (1969), which he later co-adapted into a film trilogy directed by Francis Ford Coppola.

Puzo also wrote the original screenplay for Superman (1978) and its 1980 sequel. Puzo served in the United States Army Air Forces in Germany in World War II.

Historical significance

He received the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay for the first film in 1972 and for its sequel Part II in 1974.